Category Archives: eating out

The Adventures of an Emergency Handbag

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This weekend I had two days of idle bliss planned – nowhere I had to go or be in particular and a whole lot of rather indulgent reading on the agenda! 
But at 1.30 on Saturday afternoon I got a call, an emergency handbag call requesting my presence that evening as a ‘work-do-date’. And far be it from me to disappoint a friend in need: so 2 hours later I found myself driving with my friend A into the wilds (maybe not so wild) of Hampshire to stately home,Tylney Hall.
Gorgeously frosty surrounds made this morning’s post-brekky stroll around the grounds (you know, the stroll you need to put a spring in your step after the ‘night before’) absolutely delightful…beautiful clear skies and a slight mist made it all look a bit ethereal…and we were also fascinated by a few of the more frozen aspects of our little meander!
How’s that frozen fountain?  And the frozen puddles? Pretty cool eh?
So despite the short notice and ensuing lack of sleep that followed, it was another fab adventure for this last minute ‘date’…you might want to stay tuned for another Emergency Handbag Adventure coming to this blog sometime soon…ish!

News Flash…Elvis Sighting in New Malden…

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I caught up with a friend for dinner on Thursday night and she had booked us a table at a local curry place that neither of us had been to before (Sesame in New Malden if you are absolutely dying to know).

So I arrived a little after my friend and as we embraced and said ‘hello, it’s good to see you’ and all that, she tells me that, unbeknownst to her upon booking, tonight Sesame is trialling a little something new to accompany its traditional Indian & Thai menu…

Elvis….

…yes, we looked at each other like that too!

Anyway, we ordered a drink, made our selections from the evening’s menu and had started out on almost a year’s worth of catching up when all of a sudden there was a flash, and Elvis had entered the building (albeit via the kitchen).  Surrounded by a number of groups celebrating birthdays, Christmas and anything in between, we looked bemusedly at each other, tucked in to some great food – actually the food was fantastic and I want to make sure that I make that point in the midst of all of the wittering on about Elvis – settled in to watch the show.

And what a cracking show it was!  The voice was excellent and Elvis’ charm and swagger had us all Returning to Sender and Viva Las Vegas-ing before we knew it.  Hit after well-known hit followed and after an hour of belting out those tunes, Elvis took a little break – which then resulted in some ‘here’s the highlights’ style catching up for us before his imminent return 30mins later.  Another hour of faves ensued – like Suspicious Minds, Burning Love and Can’t Help Falling in Love – and it was 11 o’clock when Elvis took his Final Curtin and left the building (again via the kitchen).

So what was supposed to be a sedate catch up between friends turned into a bit of a riot (in a good way of course) and we left agreeing that it was both completely surreal yet fabulous fun.  The compromise we’d had to make on having a good ol’ natter was definitely worth it and we might it even make it the next girl’s night out that we have!

‘Open Sesame’ really did produce a gem of a night…

Hot chicks & hens

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Last night 10 lovely ladies (or as we prefer, hot chicks) gathered to salute the last single days of our gorgeous girl, A-down-the-hill who, in two weeks time will ‘I do’ and morph from Single- to Marry-dom.  So how does one do this with appropriate pomp, circumstance and little finesse in this day and age?  Being a bunch of foodies and self-titled gourmands (ie. basically little piggies), we all went cooking.
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The Underground Cookery School lies beneath St Mary’s Church just behind Finsbury Circus and London Wall and allows participants to drink, prepare a 3-course meal, drink, eat the meal they have prepared, drink and…drink.  Last night, under the watchful eye of Missa and Happy (our two chefs) we made tagliatelle, sea bream with roasted potatoes and salsa verde, and souffle.
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It got competitive right from the get-go starting with pretty vigorous dough-making and followed by some serious pasta-machine action.  As with any daunting enterprise (ie. 10 women ranging from mildly tipsy to seriously ‘sociable’ preparing a 3 course meal that they are willing to eat at the end of it all), an early victory can be quite motivational and cries of success soon filled the room as each of us produced a proud little bundle of pasta ribbons.
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So what’s next? we asked.
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There was sea bream filleting (getting those pesky bones out is more difficult than it looks!), then tomato-(for the pasta sauce)-and potato-(for the sea bream)-roasting and salsa verde-making (again for the sea bream).
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There was also Thai green curry prep-ping (for the vegetarians in the group) and then finally the piece d’resistance, the raspberry souffle. But lo and behold, how did that ramekin of salt end up in the saucepan of raspberries – it wouldn’t have been one of we enthusiastically helpful ladies who thought it was the sugar that Missa requested, would it??  Just as well Missa had some other fruit ‘out the back’ so we did not have to go ‘souffle-less’.
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Dear oh dear.
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After over 5 hours of underground cookery and a delicious meal (with more wine), we bid our patient chefs a fond and rather noisy farewell and moved on for a cheeky cocktail at Lounge Lover in nearby Shoreditch and a quick boogie-on-down in Beach Blanket Babylon next door before dispersing for home – which for three of us was a rather nice hotel – Club Quarters opposite Leadenhall Market.  We agreed that this had two distinct advantages: (1) it was significantly better than dealing with a long trip home and a large cab fare and (2) it provided a rather fabulous opportunity to continue our festival of foodie fun into a rather scrumptious breakfast at The Modern Pantry in Clerkenwell.
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Seriously people, the best coffee I’ve had for a long time, really yummy scrambled eggs with haloumi, spinach and tomato and then a shared plate of pancakes with berry compote and creme fraiche…you London-ers reading this must go!
So that’s the night (and morning) that was – a tribute to friendship amongst fabulous women and a fitting farewell to singledom for our fair foodie friend.
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Angels & Demons…

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After being a bit disappointed by the movie version of The Da Vinci Code (particularly after loving the book) it was with a mixture of excitement and apprehension that I entered the darkened cinema on Sunday to see Angels & Demons – the book that came first and the story I loved best. And I am pleased to say that, despite some slight script tampering to pretend that The Da Vinci Code story came first, Ron Howard did a fantastic job. A great race against time with that amazing twist right at the end, we ran all over Rome with Robert Langdon, reading the symbols and absorbed in the ‘legend’ of the Illuminati right to the end. So exhausted were we from our thrilling adventure that afterwards, we decided to refresh ourselves Italian-style – at Pizza Express. Buona salute!!
To see the trailer itself, just click on the blog post title